Oktoberfest Means Fun, Food And Good Deeds

For fun lovers, beer drinkers and fund-raisers, the month of October is the time for Oktoberfest, a celebration for people who love to mix beer, bratwurst, friendship and good causes.

The parties take their name from the world's largest folk festival in Germany, where the idea originated 186 years ago as a royal wedding party.

Spelled Oktoberfest or Octoberfest, the bash is the same everywhere, even in the United States, where hundreds of American towns and cities have picked up on the name and used it as an excuse to have fun.

In Lake County, the Oktoberfest celebrations begin today at the Yalaha Country Bakery with German music, food, beer and baked specialties.

The free Saturday morning concert features Don and Jean Zimmerman, a vocal duo who also play accordion and drums.

''Come dance on the patio and sing along with them, from 10 to noon,'' said bakery owner Guenther Herold.

Herold comes from Dusseldorf, a majorGerman city that doesn't celebrate Oktoberfest, but his baker Manfred Jung worked for many years in the Bavarian resort town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, close enough to Munich to practice many of the same traditions. His large German pretzels will be authentic, he said.

''An Oktoberfest without pretzels is no Oktoberfest,'' said Jung, explaining that he would bake the traditional cross-armed pretzel forms as well as pretzel sticks for the fest patrons.

Bratwurst and other German meats that go along with German beer and oom-pah-pah music will also be served.

The bakery will stay in the Oktoberfest mood throughout the month, but the Saturday entertainment will change every week, said Herold.

Another Oktoberfest bash will take place Oct. 13 from noon to 6 p.m. at Saint Patrick's parish hall, 6801 Old Highway 441 in Mount Dora.

''This is a fund-raiser sponsored by the church's Knights of Columbus Council,'' said Robert Reagan, chairman of the event. ''It's our first annual celebration of this kind, and we hope to have many more.''

Reagan said entertainment for listening and dancing would be provided by the band called Sonny and the Shades. Organizers of the fest will prepare and sell authentic German food, such as bratwurst, knockwurst and sauerkraut as well as frankfurters (hot dogs) for the children.

Adults will be charged $5 for admission. Youngsters under 18 will be admitted free. Reagan said games for children are also on the program.

Oktoberfest '96 in Germany started two weeks ago and ends this weekend. The very first was in 1810, actually the idea of a carriage driver in the Bavarian army who suggested that in connection with an October wedding of Crown Prince Ludwig of Bavaria and Princess Theresa of Saxony-Hilburghausen, a horse race be held on the large meadow in downtown Munich.

In those days there were no suggestion-award programs, so the carriage driver's commanding officer took credit for the idea. His name, Andreas Dell'Armi, has gone down in history as the originator of the fest.

The success of the first horse race and folk fest was followed by one each year, except 25 years when interrupted by cholera epidemics and wars.

But somewhere along the way, the horses retired to the sidelines while more important things were considered, like filling the super appetites and gigantic thirsts of the ''Muncheners'' and their friends from all over the world, who favored September and early October for a visit to the city. It was probably the hope of better weather in September that moved the fest dates forward, and that is why the celebration in Munich has become a September event.

Dates, however, are not as important as the spirit of the event. In Germany, a friendly togetherness pervades the huge beer tents that now fill the meadow. Some of that rubs off on American celebrations, too, where fun is usually the order of the day and evening.